


Congratulations On Your (All Expenses Paid!) Free Hoth Getaway!

by doctornemesis



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Confessions, Drama, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fear, First Kiss, Hoth, Hurt/Comfort, Love Confessions, M/M, Rejection, dangerous missions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-08
Updated: 2016-01-08
Packaged: 2018-05-12 13:07:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,526
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5667166
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/doctornemesis/pseuds/doctornemesis
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“What’s so bad about Hoth?” Finn inquired, and by the way both of them turned their heads quickly in his direction, Finn knew they had both forgotten about his presence in the room with them.<br/>---</p><p>Finn, Poe and BB-8 find themselves on an unpleasant mission to the planet Hoth. It's unpleasant in more ways than one, and  completely worth it in only one way imaginable.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Congratulations On Your (All Expenses Paid!) Free Hoth Getaway!

**Author's Note:**

> 1.) So, Hoth, right?
> 
> 2.) This pairing is still everything to me right now.
> 
> 3.) I do not own Star Wars nor any of the characters here mentioned.
> 
> 4.) Any and all mistakes are mine!
> 
> 5.) Enjoy!

Finn watched in silence as Poe paced across the smooth stone floor, arms waving emphatically in the air as he argued openly with General Organa behind closed doors. BB-8 whistled each time Poe walked passed them, turning frequently to Finn who merely shrugged. “I’m as lost as you, BB,” he said, eyes moving between Poe’s blatant distress and General Organa’s impassive pursing of her lips.

 

“Poe,” she said finally, interrupting Poe’s tirade midcourse. “If it didn’t need to be done, and done _urgently_ , I wouldn’t be sending you. Trust me. But there is a very _important_ device left down on that planet, and it could potentially aid us greatly.”

 

Poe’s body immediately deflated at her words. “But Hoth?” he cried, scrubbing his hands over his face. “Hoth, really?”

 

“What’s so bad about Hoth?” Finn inquired, and by the way both of them turned their heads quickly in his direction, Finn knew they had both forgotten about his presence in the room with them.

 

“ _Everything_ ,” Poe stated, hands on his hips as he looked at him with his head cocked to the side.

 

“It’s just terrible,” General Organa added with a heavy sigh.

 

“And yet, you are sending _me_ there!” Poe argued, revved up once again.

 

“I’ll go,” said Finn quite suddenly. “I need more experience and staying on base isn’t going to help me get that, so...If you wouldn’t mind, I mean?”

 

Poe looked at him like he had lost his mind. “You can’t--”

 

“You would need a pilot,” General Organa said, cutting Poe off as she looked between the two, chin dipped down as an ever developing plot began to unfold in her head before their very eyes.

 

Poe sighed. “I can run this mission solo with BB-8,” he said, throwing a side glance at Finn as he did so.

 

Finn felt slightly bothered by what Poe had said. In fact, he was very bothered. So in fact, that he would bring it up once they were situated on the planet Poe was dreading to go to.

 

“I have no doubt,” General Organa said, and Finn felt his heart drop. “But maybe having a companion along for the ride would make your mission less unpleasant. Besides, Hoth is a very inhospitable planet...lots of meteors out that way. Take BB-8 and Finn, they can only help. And don’t worry, Commander, I’ll make sure you’re well equipped for the journey to come. That is, if you’re brave enough to take it…”  

 

Poe frowned then, a deeper and more brooding frown than the one of agitation before, this frown spoke openly of pride and a fear of not living up to preconceived expectations set for him. “Of course I’m brave enough,” he said, his words low and vibrating through his chest. He then turned his gaze back to Finn. “You, get ready. Make a checklist, and _don’t_ forget it this time.”

 

Poe then stormed out, BB-8 following dutifully behind him. “That was _one_ time,” Find said, arms raised out into the open and empty air as he tried to puzzle just what exactly he had done.

 

“Don’t worry,” came General Organa. “He’ll calm down. I pushed in a way I know I shouldn’t have. I will apologize to Commander Dameron before you two are set to depart.”

 

Finn nodded, knowing better than to go after Poe when he was in such a state. He had learned that, at least. “So, Hoth? What’s that really like?”

 

General Organa, face knitted in a blanket of surprise, looked at him then in a way that made him rethink his eagerness to go.

 

* * *

 

 

“Terrible!” Finn cried, digging through rubble and debris of the former Echo Base square inch by square inch. “This is just…well, _terrible_!”

 

“It’s _Hoth_ ,” Poe said, huddled in a corner as he breathed into his clasped and gloved hands.

 

“What are you doing?” Finn asked, distraught at the sight of Poe stopping for what appeared to be the twentieth time since the two had arrived that morning.

 

“I can’t feel my hands,” he answered, looking at BB-8 moving along without any slack in pace.

 

 _‘To be an android,’_ Finn thought with a touch of jealousy.

 

“I’m not meant for this type of weather, Finn.”

 

Finn halted his search then, moving to the crumbled chunk of corridor Poe sat upon. “If this is the highest peak of the sun here, I don’t want to even _know_ what nighttime is like in this place,” he said, gathering Poe’s hands into his, massaging the feeling back into the other’s limbs.

 

“I don’t ever want to find out,” Poe said, laughing for what seemed the first time in weeks. It lightened Finn’s heart a little at the sound. “Not even a little.”

 

“Did General Organa disclose to you what it is exactly we’re supposed to be looking for?” Finn asked, not pushing his luck by keeping off topic any longer.

 

Poe looked at him then, eyes dark and lips slightly chapped from the blistering cold. “She said we would know it if we found it,” he said, laughing again as Finn made a face. “You and me both, buddy.”

 

“We’re never going to find this thing! Especially if we don’t know what it is we’re looking for,” he groaned.

 

“Regret tagging along?” Poe asked, and Finn didn’t even hesitate with his response.

 

“Of course not,” he said, limbs feeling heavy with the frigid cold. “I like being where you are. It always makes things interesting.”

 

Poe’s face shifted then, from something seemingly content to something so completely torn apart as he removed Finn’s hands from his. Finn was hopeless then but to watch as Poe’s mood collapsed once more, each moment of of apparent joy or happiness spreading further and further apart. Finn felt it was his fault somehow, more than felt it, but could not bring it up without feeling foolish for it.

 

“You okay?” he asked instead.

 

Poe looked at him, but there was no depth to his eyes; it appeared as though he had locked himself away and everyone else out. “Yeah, yeah,” he said, shaking Finn off. “We’ve...just wasted so much time. Especially _me_. Look at me, just sitting here. The longer it takes us to get up, the longer it’ll take for us to find the damn thing and get off this freezing pile of heap for a planet.”

 

Finn, momentarily accepting defeat, got up to his feet before Poe could even think about it. “Okay then,” he said, his words dropping off into an unintelligible whisper.

 

“What was that?” Poe asked, catching Finn by the arm in a light grip.

 

“I agree,” Finn said, removing Poe’s hand though the loss of contact was painful to him.

 

Poe fell silent, eyes shifting across the cluttered floor as he appeared to be searching for words. Finn didn’t, couldn’t _possibly_ , understand what was wrong, and didn’t have the right words  himself to do much about it. Poe grabbed him again, and he reacted to the touch immediately, stepping into Poe’s personal space as he reached out for him; for the contact he so desired from him.

 

The words never came; however, as a loud crash shook the earth loose from beneath them, knocking them both off their feet and to the ground as they bellowed out in shock and pain. The light they had been working under shattered above them, raining jagged pieces of glass and glacier down upon them. Finn scrambled to his feet, blindly searching for Poe as he felt a deep pain in his side.

 

He was relieved to find Poe searching in the darkness for him as well. “What was that?” Finn cried, head spinning as his voice echoed in the enclosed space around them.

 

“I don’t-I don’t know. You okay?”

 

“I don’t know…”

 

“What do you mean you _don’t_ know? Are you hurt?” he asked, patting his hands down Finn’s shoulders and chest.

 

“I think-I think I just landed wrong,” Finn replied, knowing full well that he was lying, hand placed over an ever spreading wetness along his right side. A piece of glass or ice must have pierced him through, but just how badly had yet to be seen.

 

“BB-8…”

 

“BB’s got a better chance than we do,” he said, trying not to lean too heavily against Poe as they sought to find a way out.

 

“You’re right,” Poe said as they doubtfully made their way through the corridor they had entered in through, though it was a lot harder going than coming had been. “We need...we need to get out.”

 

“Are you okay?” Finn asked, tripping over a pile of rubble.

 

“What? Oh, yeah...just a little shook up. A little hard of hearing right now.”

 

“There!” Finn called, eyes studying a heavy ray of light piercing through the overt darkness. “That’s the hole we came in through!”

 

Finn offered to hoist Poe up onto his shoulders so that he could climb out first, but Poe declined. “I’ll hoist you up, you find the line and reset it. I’ll climb up after,” he said.

 

“But…”

 

“I know you’re lying to me, okay? I’m not dumb, Finn. I know you’re hurt.”

 

Finn fell silent, doing as he was told with as little aggravation to his body or complaint as he could manage. The hook holding the line had snapped, but that was not at all their biggest problem. Finn could see now what had happened, and it did not bode well for them. From the sky had fell a meteor in a size Finn had never seen before, but it was what said meteor had struck that Finn really grieved for. Their ship was obliterated to chunks of mechanical parts, and those were only the pieces Finn could see, the rest hidden underneath the belly of the behemoth that had fell so swiftly from the sky.   

 

“Oh, no. Poe…”

 

“Please don’t say--”

 

“The ship’s gone...just completely gone.”

 

“Damn it!” Poe hollered, and though Finn could not see him, he could only imagine what Poe looked like down below, striking out in the swelling darkness.

 

Finn, shaking off his ever looming sense of dread, grabbed a hold of the rope, tossing it down with nothing but a lucky guess and Poe’s hollering to guide him. “Can you see it?” he called.

 

“Of course not! But I feel it,” Poe said, giving it an exploratory tug. “Where’s the hook?”

 

“That’s gone, too, I’m afraid. Snapped into the ground, but I’ve got you.”

 

“ _You’re_ injured,” argued Poe, voice echoing ever upwards towards him.

 

“That doesn’t change the fact that I’ve _got_ you,” Finn argued back.

 

“That’s what I’m so afraid of…”

 

“What was that?” Finn questioned, not hearing him clearly, fearing he had missed something  of importance.

 

“Nothing. You ready to hoist me up?”

 

“I’m ready,” Finn answered, not ready at all by any means. He could now see the blood both pooling and freezing around him, but he ignored it for the time being.

 

“Let’s do it!”

 

“Got it!”Finn shouted down as he lifted Poe up and out with all of his strength, tapping what little reserve he had left for himself.  

  


Poe climbed the rest of the way out once he had a leg swung over, wind whipping across his face with so much force that it nearly knocked him back in. Finn caught him by the forearm, dragging him out. Poe gasped for breath, and Finn could see a faint trail of blood leading from the right side of his face down to the midpoint of his chin. “You’re hurt,” he said, reaching out to touch Poe’s face only to have the other smack it away.

 

“Of course I am!” he shouted, eyes blazing as Finn backed off. “That’s the risk of all this. You get hurt, I get hurt, we all get hurt, right?”

 

Finn felt an anger he had never come across before surge through him, determined to bring things to a head at the worst possible moment, but the pain in his side forced him down before he could get the chance. The yelp he let out echoed around them, cut short only by another powerful gust of wind. Tears stung his eyes, and he couldn’t figure out what had set it off first, his frustration peaking.

 

“ _Finn_ ,” Poe called out, placing a hand on his shoulder which Finn eagerly shrugged off.

 

“The ship is gone, and the base it too run down to keep us overnight. We’ll need...we’ll need to find another ship, one we can seal off...one that’s still equipped before nighttime if we have any chance of surviving.”

 

Poe gave a short nod, and there was a clear sense of regret written across his face as he hoisted them both up. All of their supplies except for what they had on them during the time was now all gone, and they were on their own, moving through a wasteland of unforgiving ice. Finn had never hated a planet so much before in his life.

 

“There,” he called, peering through a pair of binoculars. “An All Terrain Armored Transport. That’s our best bet, and it’s about six miles to the west of here.”

 

“And All Terrain _what_ now?”

 

“It’s an Imperial walker,” he clarified. “An Imperial transport that’s still in good shape.

 

“Think we can make it?” Poe asked.

 

Finn shrugged, not sure at all himself. “What other choice do we have?”

 

Poe sighed. “We don’t.”

 

* * *

 

 

“Well, it certainly doesn’t look cozy,” Poe said, the sound of his feet clanking against the fleshed out metal haul.

 

“It’s not _meant_ to be cozy,” Finn said, groaning in pain as he did so. “The Empire’s never been real big on that.”

 

Poe’s grip tightened as Finn’s legs nearly gave out. “What’s the best place--?”

 

“Head for the cockpit, it has- _has_ more space and it’s the only part of it that isn’t completely flipped on its side. If you find- _find_ supplies along the way, grab them,” he gritted his teeth as he spoke, breathing irregular as the travel from Echo Base had been a difficult one in every sense of the word.

 

“I’ll get you up there first, and then circle back round for supplies.”

 

“You’re hurt, too, Poe.”

 

“Not as badly as you are.”

 

“Oh,” Finn said, wishing desperately he could break the contact between them. “Is that what this is all about?” he asked, gripping the inverted railing as they began to ascend their way up to their destination.

 

“What are you talking about?” Poe asked, looking away from Finn entirely, jaw set in defiance of the accusation held on Finn’s tongue.

 

“That’s _totally_ it. The fact I’ve been injured so bad. The fact I almost didn’t make it back from the Starkiller Base...almost didn’t survive the injury to my back...almost couldn’t use my legs again without assistance.”

 

“ _Stop_ ,” Poe cut in, stress wrung tightly throughout his body. “Just stop _talking_.”

 

“ _No_ ,” Finn argued, defying the other as they traveled down the tunnel or “neck” of the body to the cockpit. Somehow, someway, they were both in one piece, if but barely.

 

“Please, Finn. Please, not now. Let me...just let me get the supplies first, okay?”

 

“Yeah,” Finn said, settling down into a large cot meant for the commander behind the two drivers that each had their own cots further forward. “Alright, but don’t think this is over, Poe Dameron.”

 

“Where would the medkits be?” he asked, not holding Finn’s gaze. “Emergency kits? Blankets...anything that’ll help us get through the night.”

 

“All on the upper and lower decks near the rearguard, that’s where everything should be.”

 

Poe met his stare then, biting his lip briefly before looking down and turning away. “Stay put,” he ordered.

 

“Wouldn’t think otherwise,” Finn called out after him.

  


Poe made a handful of trips before stopping to rest, satisfied he had found all there was to be found. “I wish there was a functioning med droid somewhere around here,” he said, producing the medical kit he had scavenged. “I’m not sure what the hell I’m doing here, man.”

 

“That makes two of us then,” Finn chirped, concern and anger not at all abated.

 

Poe scratched the stubble along his cheek, sighing as he did so. “I deserve that,” he said, producing technology so old that neither one of them knew how to properly use it. Underneath the gadgets casing laid simple, straight forward directions that Poe followed to the best of his abilities. He let out a victorious laugh when a series of green lights began to flash in a row.

 

“Tell me I’m wrong,” Finn said, and it was almost a plea as he hoisted up three layers of clothing to reveal a jagged piece of glass embedded in his side.

 

Poe looked at him, and waves of regret and compassion tidaling over his face. “I...Finn...this is, this is so hard for me to talk about,” he said, pressing down on a button that unleashed a pair of sterile clamps that took to removing the object fixed into his side, healing the fresh wound with whirling speed.

 

“You said you would,” Finn said, stern despite trying not to fidget.

 

“And I _am_ ,” Poe said, cradling one of Finn’s cheeks as he held him entranced. “I’m just struggling my way through it, okay?”

 

“Okay,” Finn whispered.

 

“The way you look at me...I can’t stand it sometimes. It’s almost too much to look at you and feel...so much happiness. So much _potential_ for what could be, and it eats me _alive_ , Finn. It turns me completely _inside_ _out_. You took off that Imperial mask, and I fell head-over-heels for that face of yours before you ever, _ever_ said a word to me. But when you came back, the _way_ you came back, I didn’t know what to do. I had never felt so bad or so damn helpless before in _my_ life. _Never_. I wanted to get both closer and further away from you as possible when you woke up, because, even though you were in the worse pain imaginable you opened your eyes, and when you saw me...they were filled with...with so much…”

 

“ _Love_ ,” Finn cut in, turning his cheek further into Poe’s embrace. “I look at you with nothing but love.”

 

Poe inhaled deeply. “ _Yeah_ , ” he breathed out. “And I don’t know what to do when you look at me that way…”

 

Finn gave a short laugh, heart torn to pieces as he said, “You’re supposed to love me back. You’re supposed to look at me the same way.”

  


“I _do_ , but I don’t want to, Finn. Feeling this way...it’s painful. I can’t even begin to describe it.”

 

Finn shuddered, the surrounding cold biting into his exposed side, but he pushed through it. “You know, if I had remained in the First Order. If you hadn’t been captured, and I hadn’t helped you to escape...there’s a good chance that either one or both of us would be dead by now, and I think...I think of all the possibilities, the fact that it could have been one of us killing the other, and let’s face it, I’m nowhere near as good a fighter as you. Combat ready? Yes, but when it came time to fight back, I didn’t,” he said.

 

Poe, with a heavy mist clouding his eyes, moved his face closer to Finn’s, cradling his other cheek as well. “I could _never_ kill you,” he said, words heavy on his tongue as he spoke.

 

Finn felt his chest clench tight. “I was _nothing_ but a number before you, Poe.”

 

Poe pressed their foreheads together. “I was nothing but _dead_ before you, Finn,” he said, voice a mere whisper between them, but to Finn, it was everything.

 

“I want to kiss you right now, Poe Dameron,” he said as Poe gave a short laugh.

 

“Then kiss me, Finn,” he replied, a pleasant if but amused grin flashing across his teeth.

 

Finn radiated a warm sense of eagerness as he took the initiative, testing his lips against Poe’s for the first time; he quite liked the taste of him even with their lips achingly cold due to the unforgiving and ungracious weather.

 

“The machine’s making a noise,” Poe said, and Finn realized that, up to that point, he had gone deaf to all else around them.

 

“I don’t care about that,” Finn admitted, and he didn’t. He really did not in that moment.

 

“Well, I do. Let’s asses the damage, shall we now?”

 

“You a doctor now?”

 

“Working on it.” Poe said, moving the series of blankets around Finn’s body to examine the robot’s handiwork. “You don’t even have a scar now.”

 

Finn looked down, surprised to see that what Poe had said was indeed true. “Wow,” he said, equally as astounded.

 

“I’m amazing,” Poe said, causing Finn to erupt with laughter.

 

“You didn’t do anything!” he exclaimed, shaking his head.

 

“Hey, that’s not fair! Do you know how long it took me to find that thing?”

 

Finn went to laugh again, but it was stifled as Poe reached out and kissed him. This time the sensation was both mind blowing and earth shattering as Poe skillfully silenced him. “C’mon, Princess. Let’s go get warmed up,” he said, guiding Finn back to the largest cot from the Commander’s seat he had been sitting on.

 

“Your head,” Finn protested.

 

“Took care of that. There’s just a little dry blood I can’t get out of my hair just yet.”

 

“When did you do that?” Finn asked, climbing to the furthest side of the cot, Poe close behind him.

 

“When I was checking out those Imperial speeders.”

 

“Any of them useful?”

 

“One, I think. I’m going to mess around with it in the morning, though.”

 

“That would definitely help,” Finn said, laughing as Poe kicked him underneath the makeshift bedding.

 

“Don’t worry, even if it’s not salvageable they’ll come looking for us the day after tomorrow.”

 

“If we don’t get smashed to pieces by another meteor, that is.”

 

“You’re so optimistic,” Poe teased.

 

“You saw what that thing did to our ship, right?”

 

“Oh, trust me. I saw. I cried a little, but my tears froze before I could really get dramatic about it.”

 

Finn sighed, eyes studying Poe’s face in the dim lighting. He was relieved that all the tension of the past month or so had been relinquished, Poe returning back to himself. Poe, noticing the wondering look to Finn’s face, reached out for him.

 

“I’m sorry,” he said. “For putting you through my own mess, but you’re young, and free...and you should be out there getting into things without me occupying your thoughts.”

 

Finn shook his head, disbelief surging through him. “I know I could be out there doing whatever it is I want, and I _am_ ,” he said, trailing his fingers along Poe’s cheekbone. “You want me to be happy, Poe, but you don’t seem to get that I am. I am happier now than I’ve ever been in my entire life, even sitting here possibly freezing to death.”

 

“We’re _not_ going to freeze to death,” Poe muttered under his breath, moving his body closer to Finn’s as the other settled his head down upon his chest, listening to the steady rhythm of his heartbeat. “And we’re not always going to get moments like this, you know? We’re not always going to get the opportunity to be together, for weeks at a time. That’s how it works.”

 

“Then,” Finn said, drawing Poe’s attention back towards him as he moved to meet his gaze. “We make the most out of what we get.”

 

“You offering?” Poe inquired, cocky as he had ever been.

 

“You taking?” Finn shot back.

 

The smirk that struck Poe’s face then was absolutely feral, and Finn felt his breath hitch in his throat as Poe flipped their positions in a sudden, unexpected move; pinning his back down to the cot beneath him. “You’re really something else, you know that?” he asked, looming over Finn with an absolute and all consuming hunger in his eyes.

 

Finn grinned from ear to ear. “So I’ve been told,” he responded, adjusting his hips as Poe fell in between his thighs like he belonged there.

 

Poe kissed him over and over, each time growing more desperate than the last. Finn couldn’t get enough of him, hands roaming down Poe’s backside as he clung tightly to him, heart pounding within the confines of his chest. The chance to have Poe so close was not an opportunity he was about to pass up.

 

“Tell me what you want to do,” Poe said, voice a low tremor as their lips parted.

 

Finn didn’t have to think long before settling on an idea. “I want to kiss and be kissed all over, and then I want to go to bed.”

 

Poe smirked, lust and love playing a crucial game of tug-o-war within the dilated pupils of his eyes. “I’m sure we can do that,” he said, hands sliding up and under Finn’s many layers of clothing.

 

* * *

 

 

Come morning it was agreed upon that while Poe worked on the Speeder in the hopes of getting it started that Finn would traverse his way back to the base in order to seek both the device they longed for and the droid so close to each of their hearts. Finn would have honestly just been relieved to find BB-8 and be done with it, but he didn’t want to fail this mission he had so readily accepted. Finn was beginning to think he didn’t like the cold much, either.

 

A loud crackling noise came over his comm as Poe called in for him across the link. “Come in, Finny-boy,” Poe’s voice quipped in loud, and for the most part, clear.

 

“We agreed that that wasn’t a real call sign,” he argued.

 

“Didn’t have time to think of something better than that.”

 

Finn rolled his eyes. “What’s up?”

 

“That Speeder I was telling you about? Seems it’s got a good chance of being up and running smoothly in no time.”

 

“Brilliant!” Finn cheered, spirits heightened immensely by Poe’s revelation.

 

“You know I am.”

 

“Not what I meant, but you get the gist. I’ll be at Echo Station 3-T-8 when you’re up and running, sorting through this mess. If you thought things looked bad yesterday you can only begin to imagine what it all looks like now.”

 

“Not looking forward to it at all, but I’ll be there as soon as possible. Poe Dameron _out_.”

 

Finn could only chuckle as he began his task of sweeping through the area, listening out for any noise that could possibly be BB-8 rummaging about. Once you set that droid on a task it only departed on said task when it was either completed or called off. Since neither Finn nor Poe had gotten the chance to call off the search, Finn could only assume the droid was still searching.

 

“I really hope BB’s found it,” he said out loud to himself, on his hands and knees as he turned over every rock, pillar or movable chunk of glacier possible; looking in every nook and cranny he could fit himself into. “Really, really hope.”

 

As Finn began his way down a fairly intact corridor, he heard what sounded to be trickling water drip, drip, dripping down from somewhere above him. That, he knew, could not be possible given the conditions on Hoth. Unless, he thought, there was an overwhelming source of heat somewhere nearby. It didn’t take Finn too long before he found that source, the device they had sought for, and BB-8 all within a span of minutes, but by the time all these things had come together it was impossible for him to get away from what happened next.

 

The corridor that had appeared to be so well intact turned out to be a breath and a loud, excited yell away from collapsing in on itself. Finn should have known better, or at least, that’s what he chastised himself for as he sat in complete darkness for what wasn’t even the first time in two days. This time; however, there was no getting out on his own. A terrible time to realize how claustrophobic one was, he thought, adding to the list of all the bad things this mission had produced in such a short amount of time.

 

“Come in, Poe. Come in,” he said, tapping on his comm as it stuttered in and out, redirecting his own words back to him in a high pitched whine.

 

“What’s up, Finny-boy?”

 

“One, stop calling me that. Two, I’m going to need you here quicker than ‘as quickly as possible’.”

 

“Where are you? You sound like you’re in a cave?”

 

“Well, it sort of is now…”

 

“You’re buried in the glacier?” he asked, voice echoing loudly in the close confines of the collapsed debris.

 

“Corridor, but yeah.”

 

“I’ll be there as fast as this thing can move me, don’t worry.”

 

“I saw BB-8, though. He’s somewhere above the wreckage. I also have what I believe to be the device we’ve been searching for.”

 

“Really?”

 

“Well, you said that she said that we would know if we found it. I’ve found it.”

 

“What is it?”

 

“Believe it or not, it’s another Astromech droid. Older, of course, but in solid shape.”

 

“Does it turn on?”

 

“It did...right before everything caved in. It turned itself off about five minutes in. I guess it couldn’t take the idea of being stuck with me in the dark.”

 

“Hm, couldn’t see why not, but maybe that’s just a personal preference.”  

 

Finn rolled his eyes for what seemed like the hundredth time that mission. “Come. Get. Me.”

 

“On it. Just hold on, your highness.”

 

“ _Poe_.”

 

“Poe Dameron _out_.”

 

* * *

 

 

Poe reached him in record time, assessing just how he was going to get Finn out; however, took much longer. Thankfully, BB-8 arrived in time to help, but there wasn’t much for Finn to do other than to sit and wait, and think some more. Something Poe accused him often of overdoing.

 

Finn knew that Poe had thought about his parents when discussing the potential snags and hardships to come, comparing their relationship to that of theirs. Finn found it all rather silly at first; by all accounts Poe’s parents had a remarkable and enduring relationship that only came to an end when Poe’s mother had unexpectedly died when he was six years old. Finn wondered about his own parents then, trying to imagine what they were like in both looks and personality, but he fell short of the mark because had no recollection of them; no reference point to go off of.

 

Poe’s parents both had dangerous and long appointed assignments that took them away from each other for weeks at a time, and even after Poe was born they kept on until they had both decided that they no longer wanted that life, each of them having put in the time and dedication to retire with no malice or blame pointed in their direction. Maybe that was the problem, Finn thought. Poe was so invested in his role in the Resistance that the idea of wanting something more in life was terrifying for him to think about. Little did he know then that Finn himself had no interest in giving up on the fight anytime soon. Not with everything he had on the line now. Poe, Rey, General Organa...they had all renewed a spark in Finn to continue down on the right path.

 

Finn mauled this over for quite sometime before Poe was able to hoist him up and out. “I need to tell you something,” he said as Poe’s face finally came into focus.

 

“What?” Poe asked, bent over and struggling to breathe with his hands placed over his knees. “I thought my hands were stiff before, but that doesn’t even compare to what they feel like now.”

 

Finn lifted Poe’s face up so that their eyes met. “We’re always getting out of some sort of jam together,” he said, meeting Poe’s curious gaze. “Look, you told me that your mom was a Starfighter pilot and your dad was a Sergeant for the Resistance, right? I mean, I’m no Sergeant, but they made it work somehow for all those years. _We_ can make it work somehow. Poe, you can keep me close or you can push me away completely, but neither one you choose will make any difference because I would still love you, and that… _that_ was one of the first choices I’ve ever made in my entire life. So it’s your turn now to choose, too.”

 

Poe studied him for a long time, a slow smile spreading across his sharp face as he embraced him, kissing Finn hard once on the mouth. “Let’s get out of here and go...well, I guess it’s home for now. You and me...together, all right?”

 

Finn smiled then, too. “Yeah, all right,” he said, both droids in tow as they navigated their way back to base, the cold long forgotten.   

  
  
  


 

 

 

 


End file.
